


The Shadow of the Tower

by Lykegenia



Series: Rosslyn Cousland [3]
Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Alistair being awkward, Dorks in Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, First Love, Fluff and Angst, Kissing at Midnight, sfw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-06
Updated: 2016-06-06
Packaged: 2018-07-12 15:53:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7112428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lykegenia/pseuds/Lykegenia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The return to Ostagar leaves a bitter taste in the mouths of those who remember the fateful battle. A moment of introspection allows Alistair and Rosslyn to share their ghosts - and find comfort where they can.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Shadow of the Tower

**Author's Note:**

> Guess who sent her Warden back to Ostagar and then got emotions about it. Thanks go to my wonderful friend Lisa, without whom I would never have ended up i nthe sinkhole that is BioWare feels.

The fire ticked quietly, teething at the pine logs they had scavenged from the last of the wood store not pillaged or corrupted by darkspawn. Alistair couldn’t tell if it was the spitting sap that woke him, the cold wind at his neck, the inhuman cries of things lurking beyond the camp – or the absence of his love’s weight at his side.

He sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. It was possible she had just walked beyond the circle of firelight to relieve herself, and she had definitely gone armed and armoured because none of them dared stray far from their weapons in such hostile territory, but still worry prickled in his gut. This was Ostagar. Bad things lingered here. Taint had overrun the place.

“How goes the watch? All quiet?” he asked, quietly so as not to disturb Wynne.

Morrigan merely regarded him. She had been quiet all day, and had said nothing at all since that afternoon, when she had almost too-casually mentioned that Flemeth’s hut was within a day’s easy walk of the great Tevinter ruin. Not that her silence bothered Alistair. It meant she spent less time needling him, and if the price for that meant her face took on a sour, introspective look, he considered it fair exchange.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” he grumbled, scrambling to his feet. Sitting around in his armour had left his entire right leg numb, and now it protested with violent pins and needles as he staggered upright. “Did you, um, see which way Rosslyn went?”

A smirk tinged her lips. “Are you worried, that you cluck after her like a mother hen?”

“We’re in the middle of the Korcari Wilds, at night, in a place that until this evening was crawling with darkspawn.” Alistair sighed and passed a hand over his eyes. “Yes, I’m worried about her.”

“You really do love her, don’t you?”

He blinked at the unexpected tenderness in the witch’s voice, but she had taken a twig to poke at the fire and no longer met his eyes. For a moment he said nothing, but then the silence around them pressed in, and he had never been very good at not talking.

“She’s everything to me,” he admitted. “Sometimes I think about the end of the Blight and what might happen, and I… I just don’t want to. I couldn’t face it, I think. And don’t take that as an opportunity to remind me about duty and honour and all that,” he added as a frown creased between Morrigan’s golden eyes. “I already know well enough a Grey Warden’s life isn’t their own, and I don’t need to hear it from you.”

The witch poked the fire again.

 _Well, this was a fun chat,_ Alistair decided. _Definitely in the top ten_. If she wasn’t going to tell him where Rosslyn had got to, then he would have to go looking himself, and run the risk of either walking in completely the wrong direction (more likely, with his luck) or walking in on a fearsome warrior at a time no lady should ever be disturbed. Maybe she would laugh and call him sweet for caring while he tried to explain his intentions, instead of running him through and asking questions later.

He had taken all of three steps towards the edge of camp when Morrigan’s voice halted him once more.

“I am not as cold-hearted as you believe me to be, Alistair.” Her voice rang with a deep, soft sadness, like the lonely drip of water in a dry cave. “I too have wondered what it must be like to love, to be cherished in the way you cherish our fearless leader. Of course, were I ever to fall in love it would never be with someone like you – I have much better taste – but I do envy, somewhat, what you share.” She fell silent and met his gaze, all trace of her usual sarcasm washed away.

“Er, right.” Maker’s breath, how was he supposed to respond to _that_? There must have been an insult in that little speech he missed.

“Rosslyn went the other way,” Morrigan said, tilting her head towards the crumbling walls of the ruin proper. “The shadow of the tower was too long on her.”

Frowning slightly as he tried to puzzle out that last remark, Alistair thanked her and picked a path into the darkness. Above, the clouds that threatened snow earlier had rolled away and he was thankful for the bright stars and the brilliant, mismatched eyes of Satina and Sevuna staring down on him. They illuminated the potholes and the scattered, frozen detritus of battle that he surely would have tripped over otherwise.

As he wound his way down through the ruin in the direction Morrigan had pointed him, he shivered at how big the place felt in the dark. His unease increased as time passed without any sign of his fellow Warden, save for the odd foot- or paw-print in the windblown snow. The only thing keeping his panic at bay was the certainty that if something had tried to ambush Rosslyn, she would have fought back, and he would have heard the confrontation.

Or would that be the case? The snow muffled most sounds, and what was left echoed strangely between the half-tumbled walls. Had they really only been here five months ago? Had these ruins really echoed with the screams of dying Grey Wardens and the last battle cry of the king who had also been his brother? It seemed like a dream in the moonlight.

A shadow moved on the edge of Alistair’s vision. Taut nerves sent his hand to the sword at his hip – Maric’s sword, he realised dimly. His father’s sword. A king’s sword, unfit for the hands of a bastard, but it would do for any darkspawn brave enough to linger in this place. _Please let her be alright_. A heartbeat, two, as he tried to make out the figure on the dais at the end of the hall. It didn’t seem aware of his presence, but then another joined it, shorter and squatter, and his poor night vision hissed _hurlock - genlock_ to the rhythm of his pulse. He stepped forward, as quiet as he could be in heavy mail boots, and eased the dragonbone blade the first few inches from its sheath.

The hurlock whirled at the sound, its hands drawing its blades so fast they flashed like lightning. The genlock rose from its bulky haunches and _growled_.

Relief pulled at the corners of his mouth as he loosened his grip on the sword. “Relax, it’s just me.” 

“Alistair?” He heard a sigh, and what might have been a breathy, nervous chuckle as Rosslyn sheathed her swords. “You startled me.” Beside her, Cuno gave a low huff and trotted towards him, wiggling his hindquarters and grinning in proper mabari contrition. One did not growl at one’s friends.

“It’s good to see you too, Barkspawn,” Alistair murmured as he fondled the dog’s ears.

“Don’t call him that.”

“Why not? He doesn’t mind.” ‘Barkspawn’ gave an affirmative _wuff_ and ambled away to investigate a shrub.

“Ugh.”

The two Wardens observed each other across the space between them, neither quite ready to voice the weight on their minds. Moonlight gilded Rosslyn’s dark hair and armour, washing it of colour and turning her into a mythic figure, something to rival all the long stories about the hero ancestors she must have listened to as a child. The strength and grace in her tall frame, honed since birth, were things Alistair marvelled at every day, though they rarely struck him with as much force as they did in that moment. She had brought them all so far, through darkspawn and loss and petty nobles who wanted them dead. He found his mouth had gone dry.

“Are you alright?” he asked, tripping over his swollen tongue. “I woke up and you weren’t in camp.”

Her grey eyes slid away from his, out over the steep hills of Ostagar and the black spike of the Tower of Ishal that stood like a snapped spear against the sky. “I couldn’t sleep.” She folded in on herself, tucking her arms around her stomach as if to hold in her unease. “Being here again, it brought it all back. All of it. Mama and Father – Fergus. I thought I’d put it behind me, but…” She shook her head. “There’s something about this place, don’t you think? It’s… there’s something fateful. In the stones, maybe. I think I understand what Wynne was talking about when she said the Veil was thin here.”

“A lot of people died,” he replied, coming to stand beside her on the precipice. “It’s hard not to blame yourself.” He followed her gaze to the tower, fists clenching at the memories that bubbled in his mind. He wanted to take Rosslyn away from the futility of their war, he wanted to kiss away the grief on her lips and wrap his arms around her so nothing could ever make her cold again. _Damn duty_ , he thought savagely, nudging her into an embrace.

Their armour plates screeched in protest when they bumped and Rosslyn laughed against his neck.

“Ugh, that was a nasty sound.”

“Don’t think it’ll make me let go of you.”

“Perish the thought.”

They stood quiet, soaking in the sounds of the winter night and the snuffling mabari a few feet away. Alistair’s gaze wandered up the walls of the ruin and across the floor, and only then did he realise where they stood. This was where it had all begun. He had been here the day before the battle, complaining about mages and Chantry mothers, oblivious to the pain that had shone so clearly in her eyes. And later, this was where he had attended her Joining, watched as first Daveth then Jory died. She had glanced at him when Duncan turned to her, chalice in hand, and told her to drink. Everything might have been different.

“At least there’s one good thing to be found here,” he murmured against her hair.

She frowned and pulled away.

“What’s that look for?” he asked.

“Only you could find a positive in the middle of a ruin.”

Alistair smiled, tilting his chin up to kiss her forehead. “Well, this _is_ where we met. Properly, I mean. With introductions and everything.”

“Hm. The start of a beautiful relationship.”

“I am rather gorgeous aren’t I?”

“And you have good taste,” she retorted, pressing closer. His breath fogged against her lower lip, the worn leather of one gauntleted hand tracing the sensitive muscles at the back of her neck. He always kissed her chastely at first, teasing a response with gentle pressure and the brush of his fingers over her skin. Sometimes she indulged in the sweetness of these kisses, but here, lost in memories and the heaviness of their destiny, she hungered for the only warmth that could chase the nightmares away. She drew him closer, revelling in the scrape of his stubble against her chin, the slight meaty taste of the stew they had had for dinner that lingered on his mouth, the places where his lips chapped from the cold. His fingers wound up into her hair, his other hand firm at her waist so she couldn’t move away, as if the realness of him was something she would ever want to escape.

She whimpered when he darted his tongue along her lip, asking permission to go further. “Alistair… OW!”

His eyes flew open. “What? _What_?!” Had he hurt her? Had something attacked them? Surely the dog would have warned them of any approaching darkspawn. His confusion only grew when Rosslyn giggled.

“Alistair, your gauntlet is tangled in my hair.”

“What?”

“It’s stuck.”

Realisation caught up with him in a tumble of apologies as he tried to unwind his fingers from their position at the base of her skull, then cursed when the movement made her yelp and knotted her hair worse than ever.

“Alright, stand still. Let me try and work this out. Can you -? Thanks.”

Getting the other glove caught around the first would have been of no use whatsoever, so while Rosslyn tugged the gauntlet off his free hand, he turned her towards the moonlight in an attempt to better see what he was doing. Of course, given that Rosslyn’s hair was black enough to make the shadows envious, it turned out to be far less of an advantage than he had hoped.

“You’re not making this easier, you know,” he grumbled a few minutes later as she flecked little kisses up and down the side of his neck.

“Is that so?” Her breath tickled his ear and he had to still his fingers in her hair and count to ten.

“Minx. Do you _want_ me to rip half your hair out?”

Rosslyn muttered something indistinct and fingered the dagger at her belt. “I could cut it all off if that would help.”

“Don’t you dare!”

She left off her kisses, frowning at the vehemence in his voice, surprised when he pressed his lips against her nose.

“I know what your hair means to you noble ladies. There, you’re free!”

“Finally.” With a shake of her head, Rosslyn stepped back, bending down to reassure Cuno, who had been sniffing worriedly at her hand since the whole debacle started. Satisfied, the mabari gave her vambrace a lick and wandered off again. “Now where were we?”

Alistair grinned as he pulled his gauntlets back on. “You’re incorrigible.”

“You love it.”

“True. But we should head back to camp before I start getting ideas about ignoring our ‘armour on at all times in case of rudely timed darkspawn attacks’ rule.” He reached out to lace his fingers through hers, allowing himself a moment to enjoy the dark flush that bloomed on her cheeks.

“You really have such uncouth thoughts at times.”

“You love it,” he parroted.

“Come on.” She pulled at their joined hands. “We should try to get some sleep before we leave in the morning – _sleep_ , mind.”

“Now who’s being uncouth?”

Ostagar’s ruins seemed less dark as they made their way back through the maze of collapsed walls and cracked floors, as if the shadows, no longer sure of their power, shrank away from the pair winding their way in silence towards the warm fire spitting in a corner, and the friends who slept around it. Sevuna had dipped beneath the horizon, leaving only the smaller, greenish light of Satina to show the path.

“Alistair?”

“Mm?”

“How are _you_ feeling?” Rosslyn leaned back to get better view of her lover’s half shadowed face as they walked. He had lost so much more than her in this miserable place, and she had been too wrapped up in her own sorrow to even think of his pain. At least she had fond memories of her family, a lifetime’s worth of treasures to reflect on if the struggle became too hard, but Alistair had only just found acceptance to have it ripped away from him.

He squeezed her hand. “If this is about Cailan, I’ve told you already. You don’t need to worry about me. He was never much of a brother, just a king, and one with more hope than sense, to be honest. And as for Duncan, and the rest...” he trailed off, not meeting her eyes. “They were Grey Wardens. They knew what they were doing.”

A sigh escaped her lips. The words carried a distance she had not felt from him since Lothering, a kind of self-pity that she, wallowing in her own tragedy, had scorned all those months ago. Perhaps after all, then, returning to Ostagar had more than one purpose, allowing them to slash open old wounds that had festered unnoticed under the greater dramas of their lives.

“That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt,” she told him, raising a hand to cup his cheek. Thank the Maker for her height, which made it difficult for him to avoid looking at her. “Tell me. Please?”

“It’s silly.”

“No. That’s what I thought last time you were hurting like this, and I was wrong. Maker, I was a bitch to you.”

For a steady moment he struggled, his eyes soft and his breath held in the gloom, sorely tempted to deflect the conversation somewhere other than his brittle insecurity, but the gathered shadows and frozen corpses made this a time to be sincere. Also, he couldn’t think of a clever response to her admission that didn’t make him sound like an awful person.

“You win,” he said instead, turning his face into her palm. “I guess it’s just that I don’t know why Duncan decided to send me up the tower with you – not that I’m not grateful to be alive, but it would have made more sense for him to send one of the others – Arlyon, maybe, or Falkirk. Someone with more experience of being a Warden who could have noticed earlier what Loghain was up to.” An image of the retreating army flashed in his mind; Cailan’s body, bloated and broken and strung up for the ravens. “Maybe if I had been on the field instead… someone better at your side… maybe then things would have been different.”

With a frustrated huff, Rosslyn pulled him in for a crushing hug, holding him until the shock wore off and he wrapped his arms about her waist and buried his face in her hair. “It wasn’t Duncan,” she said once his breathing settled.

“What?”

“I thought he’d told you. It wasn’t Duncan who ordered you into the Tower of Ishal – it was Cailan.”

Alistair tried to disentangle himself from the embrace but she held on. “What? But, why?”

She swallowed and pressed a kiss to the pulse point below his ear. “I think he knew. As soon as I arrived and told him what Howe had done to my family, he knew what Loghain would do. And he wanted you safe.”

This time, Alistair managed to break free. His gaze turned cold. “You mean he wanted an insurance for the throne in case the battle went pear-shaped.”

“If that’s what you choose to believe. But I doubt a man as calculating as that would have inspired such love in his subjects.”

“Loghain does. Or did you miss those parts where he sent all those people to kill us?”

“The banns and arls loyal to Loghain remember what he used to be, or they believe what he says about the Grey Wardens and about Orlais because it’s easier than confronting the truth of the Blight. He’s been living on the grace of his past glory.” A dry chuckle fell from her lips, devoid of humour. “But Cailan - Cailan was hope for the future, and he had faith in you, so what does that say?”

“That he was damned desperate.”

An edge of steel crept into Rosslyn’s voice. “Alistair, stop this. Your worth is not defined by your father’s blood, and nor was it ever. I did _not_ fall in love with a phylactery.”

The absurdity of the words was only matched by the warmth spreading from the centre of Alistair’s chest. _I fell in love with…_ It banished thoughts of Cailan’s motives and Duncan’s secrets in favour of far more delicious imagery. “I should hope you didn’t, that sounds disgusting.”

She snorted. “Ah, you’re happy again. Finally, I can go to sleep.”

“Not so fast, dear lady,” he purred, catching her around the waist as she tried to escape towards the fire, and snickering despite the rasp his armour made as it grated against her back. “I wish to know just who – or what – it is you have fallen in love with.”

“The jealous type, are we?”

“Terribly jealous,” he replied, nuzzling her ear.

“That’s a shame. I never kiss and tell. Now let me go.”

“As my lady commands. Quick question, though: is he taller than me?”

She tossed a contemptuous glance over her shoulder, as much a noble lady as she could muster in the early hours of the morning. “I suppose he must be about your height, actually,” she said, not quite able to hide her smirk. Her hand drifted out behind her, fingers stretched out for him to take so they could walk back into the sheltering circle of the firelight. In the morning, they would pack up their camp and leave Ostagar, this time for good, burdened down with duty and the expectations carried in the weight of Maric and Duncan’s swords. Until then, they were free to find respite in the comfort of each other and the oblivion of sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> In case there's any confusion about Satina and Sevuna, Thedas canonically has two moons, the smaller of which is Satina. The larger one doesn't have an official name that I could find, so I decided to make one up by mixing the elvhen word for moon (evune) with some scrambled pig-Tevene, because that seems to be a trend in Thedosian astronomy.
> 
> I would also like to point out that when I was planning this it was intended to be far more angsty, but these two are just too much dorks in love, and so it turned into fluff. What can you do?
> 
> Please tell me what you think!


End file.
